No One Knows
by PaigeL
Summary: This is my first fic... It's a little random, but please give it a chance, It'll get better! It's Harry's sixth year, and... yeah, just read it... please...


Title: No one knows

Author: PaigeL

Pairings: It will become clear in later chapters… hopefully…

Rating: PG-13 Maybe too high, I don't know. I guessed…

A.N. Ok. This is my first fanfic, and I actually don't know where it's going. It's sort of writing itself, and I don't have any idea if it's good. But please review. If you flame, well, I'll just ignore you. But if you're nice, then I'll try to listen to advice… I don't have any idea how long this is going to end up, but I'm thinking I should shut up now and let you read the story. Oh, and I PROMISE it gets better. The beginning is really the worst part…

Chapter 1

After fifth year, Harry hadn't done anything on his return to Privet Drive but sit around, and, one day, spend several hours attempting to write a letter that would convince Dumbledore to let him go to the Burrow, or to Grimmauld Place. In Harry's opinion, he had definitely been at the Dursley's long enough, but he had given up, after five attempts, on the letter to Dumbledore, knowing that it was pointless, and had instead written one very short letter, like the ones he sent every three days, to Remus Lupin, stating that he was still alive, and, if anyone could pick him up from Privet Drive and take him somewhere, anywhere, else, that he would be eternally grateful. Ron and Hermione had sent him letters. So many letters… but Harry just had no idea what to say to them.

Harry sat up in bed at four o'clock one morning - he'd been at Privet Drive for about two weeks - and decided to send one letter to each of them, in case they worried – it was the sort of thing Hermione did – but half way through writing Hermione's letter, he realised that he was practically just writing Ron's letter out again, and proceeded to add Hermione's name next to Ron's. Since there was just no way he could make "Why is nobody getting me out of here?", a sentence he had longed to write, sound less pathetic, he had given up on that, and written –

Dear Ron, and Hermione 

_ How are you? How's everyone? Are you at the Burrow? I'm assuming that Hermione's wherever you are, Ron, and if she's not, tell me, cause I'm just going to assume she's there, and if I write again, it'll be to her too. Sorry to talk about you like you aren't there, Hermione, I'm just not sure if you are or not._

_ See you soon?_

_Harry_

Hoping that "See you soon?" hadn't made him sound stupid, he sent the letter off with Hedwig, and pulled on a pair of dark jeans and a black t-shirt. He knew that he couldn't go out, but he wanted to get dressed anyway. When he was done, he sat back on his bed. Afraid to go back to sleep, back to dreams of Sirius falling… of Sirius lying on the ground, just ahead of him, of running, trying to get to Sirius, running and not moving… calling to Sirius, Sirius staring straight through him, unblinking, and all of this over the sound of Bellatrix laughing… Harry shivered, and wrapped his arms around his knees, tears coursing down his cheeks… he knew it was his fault Sirius was gone… "I'm so sorry, Sirius…" Harry heard a floorboard creak. He wiped his eyes quickly with the corner of his duvet, and walked slowly and silently to the door. He pulled the door open quickly, and Dudley, who had been standing with his ear to Harry's closed door, and holding a peanut butter sandwich in each hand, fell into the room. Harry sidestepped his falling cousin, and stared down at him. "Dudley? _What _the _hell_ are you doing?"

Dudley struggled up from the floor. "Who's Sirius?" asked Dudley. Harry said nothing. "A rebound from what's-his-name? Harry didn't bother to reach for the wand lying on his bedside table. "Don't. Say. His name."

"Who's, Sirius'?"

Harry moved involuntarily towards the table, his hand outstretched. Dudley, not noticing that his cousin was moving, started to chant in a whisper; "Harry and Sirius, sitting in a tree, K-I-aaargh!" Dudley, suddenly realising that Harry's wand was on the table directly under Harry's hand, panicked and tried to run away, but tripped over his own feet, and fell over again. Harry left his wand on the table. Rage evident in his voice, he said "You will not say his name. Ever. Do you understand?" When Dudley didn't reply, Harry reached for his wand again, and just as his fingers touched it–

"Don't bother, Harry!"

"_Lupin?_" Harry released his wand, turned away from Dudley, and walked back to his doorway. Remus Lupin was standing at the top of the stairs.

"Hello, Harry." Lupin smiled sadly. "You haven't been sleeping, have you?"

"Well - Dudley, stop whimpering! Shut up and get out of my room!"

Dudley ran back to his own bedroom and pulled the door shut behind him. "Well, um – I get enough… You have _no_ idea how much I want to leave this place. What are you doing here? Can I leave? Where are you staying? Can I come back with you? Please?" Harry knew he sounded desperate, and he didn't care. His hatred for Dudley had somehow managed to double in the last five minutes. Harry didn't wait for Remus to reply before saying "I'll kill Dudley next time I see him. Or maybe I'll just… hit him. A lot…"

"He's not worth it Harry."

"He was talking about S-Sirius!"

"You should just ignore him."

**A.N. I promise it gets better from here! It really does!**

"Lupin, you sound like – _Hermione?_"

"You really shouldn't hit him, Harry." She hugged him, and kept talking, "Fist-fighting is a terrible habit to get into."

"Hermione! How did you get here? I mean, I know you hate to fly…"

"Arabella Figg. She has a fireplace, we can just Floo to it…" Ginny had reached the top step, and came to hug Harry too.

"Hi Ginny. You – you can just Floo to Arabella Figg's house at -" Harry checked his watch, "4.22?"

"Uh, well, you know… She didn't exactly know that we were going to turn up at four in the morning… But she agreed to let Order members use her fire place 'When it was necessary', so we sort of… took her up on it." Ginny smiled at him, but her smile quickly reverted to a yawn, and she retreated to stand by Hermione.

"Don't worry, Harry, if your cousin says anything more about Sirius, I promise you, I'll be jinxing him into next month." Tonks was nearing the top of the stairs. Harry, afraid of being hugged again, was trying to think of a way to back away from her without looking like he was doing it, when she stopped, winked at him, and leaned against the banister. "Wotcher, Harry!"

"Hey. Your hair's different again."

Tonks smiled back at him. "Yep! You like it?"

Harry, who had never been asked by a girl whether he liked her hair, wasn't entirely sure what to say. Deciding that he did actually quite like it, he said "Uh – yeah. It's cool."

"I wish Mum would let me dye my hair green…" Ginny said wistfully.

"You know Mum'll never let you, Ginny, and anyway, Tonks can change it back to… back to… whatever colour it is naturally. Hey, Harry."

"Hi, Ron. I sent Hedwig with a letter for you - " To Harry's astonishment, the owl flew up the stairs and landed on his shoulder, and Ron pulled the small scrap of parchment from his pocket. "How did she know?"

"Harry, I know it's, what, 4.30? But you should be more awake than that…There was no address, just Ron's name, so she took it to him."

"Thanks, Hermione. I guess you're right, I'm really not awake…"

"Well, I could tell, you see, from how bad your grammar was in that letter."

"Ok, shut up now, Hermione." Harry smiled at her, realising that, no matter how annoying it was when Hermione talked about things like grammar, he'd actually missed it.

"Sorry."

"Uh – At the risk of sounding like Moody – We need proof that he's really Harry…" said Tonks.

"My Patronus is a stag," said Harry at once.

"Yes," said Tonks, "I know, that's what we asked last time. Or, what Remus asked last time. But, we need to find out a different way."

"Oh, I guess you're right. Ok. Um…" Harry was at a loss. How could he prove that he was himself? "How do we do this, then?" he asked, looking at Lupin.

"Well, Harry, I'm sorry, but I'm tired, and I don't feel remotely inventive, so I'm just going to let you lot figure something out," said Remus, smiling tiredly. Harry looked hopelessly around at his friends.

"Word association?"

**A.N. Ok, well, I hope you liked it. Actually, I'll be glad if you finished it at all… Please review? I've already written a couple more chapters, but I can't access them right now, they're on another computer… They're better! They really are!**


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